CultMin Romascanu: National Village Museum - the most prominent representative of Romanian cultural diplomacy.
The Dimitrie Gusti National Village Museum is the most prominent representative of Romanian cultural diplomacy, and a visit to this institution hardly misses from the agenda of any foreign tourist, Culture Minister Lucian Romascanu said on Wednesday at the opening of the Village Museum Days string of events taking place between May 10 and 17, told Agerpres.
"There is a huge chunk of the Romanian soul here and I am happy to see that this Romanian soul is getting richer every year with new buildings, new constructions, new events. People from all over the world come here, I think that the Village Museum hardly misses from the agenda of any foreign tourist. It is the most prominent representative of Romanian cultural diplomacy, although this is not necessarily laid out in its job description, but this just comes naturally. And I am glad that we've had this museum for 87 years now and I would like it to last as long as the Romanian village will endure, that is forever," Romascanu said.
Museum manager Paula Popoiu said on this occasion that the mission of the institution is to carry on the work of the Bucharest School of Sociology whose mentor Dimitrie Gusti founded the Village Museum, which today bears his name.
"We look at the Village Museum as the most important creation of the Bucharest School of Sociology. The visionary and charismatic Dimitrie Gusti created many institutions for this country. Some lasted just one or two years (...), but the Village Museum is the lasting legacy of the Bucharest School of Sociology and of the effort made by these extraordinary people of the interwar period. Perhaps none of the School's scholars thought that it would be exactly this museum that would represent and carry forward its work," Popoiu said.
"The Village Museum in Bucharest and another 19 village museums throughout the country are the 'golden boxes' where we keep the proof of our identity: the Romanian village. The Village Museum is a fresco of the time, but it is clearly also a living museum, (...) in permanent dynamics, in permanent effervescence. And for this reason, the museum draws as many as 900,000 visitors a year," Paula Popoiu went on to remark.
On Wednesday, the museum's 'H.H. Stahl' Foyer Hall will host the opening of the exhibition "The shoulder embroidery folk blouse in the UNESCO Heritage", bringing together over 100 heritage items from the museum's collections. Opened on Royalty Day, the exhibition is intended as a tribute to Queen Maria, the one who loved and intensely promoted the authentic Romanian traditional costume.
The events marking the museum's 87th anniversary, which will also include inaugurations, book launches, Romanian traditional music shows and a fair of folk artisans, will end on May 17 with the opening of the exhibition "120 Years Since the Birth of Gheorghe Focsa", dedicated to the great ethnographer who served as director of the Village Museum for over 40 years.
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